He has stated, multiple times in many videos that he does not accept gifts nor any sort of compensation for his content (unless it's a paid advertiser spot. And in those cases he always makes sure that the advertiser does not compete in the same space as the product being reviewed).
When he's beating around the bush about acquiring something, it's because he's protecting his source. He got some Ryzen processors early, but not from AMD. So he had to keep those people who provided the processors to him quiet in order to protect their seller partnership with AMD. Also stated clearly in his videos.
I don't see much "Diva" behavior, but that's on you.
He doesn't take cash directly from manufacturers unless it's a paid advert spot. When he's provided with samples he uses them for reviews.
Sensationalist articles and videos and click bait are all part and parcel of trying to get eyeballs on content. When he rants, it's usually very justified.
You do know he has to negotiate directly with those companies whom he places ads for in his videos. Depending on how they feel about him, the money paid for those highlights can go up, down, or even stop.
Sorry, I should have said products in return for loose agreements around maybe you can review these at some point in time or feature them. Not a gift then right?
As for 'Divo' behavior, look at anything that might impinge on his image. The most recent is his ranting outburst video about the 5600XT where he can't even keep the performance delta straight... He flip flops from saying it's from the original 5600XT bios to the 5700 and back again, using the same number. Towards the end he even says that his biggest or one of the issues is that people might blame him.
I'm sorry but protecting his source of long since available Quadros makes no sense.
I was fine with him shitting on the Radeon VII because it's not a n amazing gaming card, but it's the king of compute performance per dollar. I could fit six of them in a TR40 motherboard, watercool them all, add a bloody chiller, and still pay less than a single headless V100.
Why you ask... Well he didn't care about workstation or compute performance until he 'aquired' 2 V100 cards, worth $20K USD. Then he makes a big song and dance about the 2060 KO being so much faster at workstation tasks...
Yeah... Then he has nothing but NV in his personal boxes... He's human he's got bias built in, but there are things he does that doesn't leave him beyond reproach or skepticism.
Like I won't use him as a sole source for thermal paste wisdom. I do watch his videos for the year down parts and his news videos are a handy congregation of news stories, some of them I miss.
Steve knows his stuff, but I view him as a source of information, to be taken as part of several sources.
If he buys those samples from 'protected' sources, then he just has to say so. If he's given it for the review or to feature in a video series he should declare it. He should declare everything, every time, not rely on well I declared it once in a video ages ago.
Yeah, I still chuckle about how he had a X299 Gigabyte motherboard ad when he was reviewing AMD that was thumping the Intel CPUs that go in that motherboard... LoL
